14 is a lot. Ho hum. Guess the Os will have to beat all the top sides to make the playoffs and win away in Ireland to win the thing. Of course that’s been the route to success in the past but there’s always the alternative of tailing off horribly. Who can ever say?

Wow some big results there, interesting to see what happens in the AP, tigers and Quins have an interesting mix of eps players returning – flood, waldrum & Manu for tigers and care, Robson, JTH at Quins

You’d say Quins so quite well in the 6N with Evans, Easter, big Mo, all available.

Oh and ie decided to become an honoury Scotland fan for the rest of the 6N

After careful consideration it’s clear you scots don’t know how to handle the favourites tag and need someone with experience to join the ranks and show the way..

Borderboy – been in Embra, a lovely city, loadsa times as I have good family there, but oddly, have several times been the subject of random verbal attacks by strangers there. Had a lovely time in Glasgow, which is supposed to be the rough town. And I prefer Glasgow writers to Edinburghians, in the main. And Billy Connolly rocks.

Yosoy – which (if any) of the Welsh team are from Ceredigion? Hard to imagine that it can be many of them having grown up and played at school there all be it quite some time ago. Surely the speakers are all Camarthenshire or Valleys with the odd one from North Wales? – would be happy to be wrong.

Welcome Clyde.

If I’ve understood your question correctly, none of the teams are from Ceredigion (although the Scarlets may have responsibility for that cachment area). The regions represent towns along the southern coast — Scarlets furthest west, followed by Ospreys, then Blues, then Dragons (representing Llanelli, Swansea, Cardiff and Newport, in that order).

I managed to miss all the rugby tonight except for the first half of the Ulster game. Will hopefully catch more over the weekend.

@claw

From the sounds of it I might have to go on to the TG4 player and watch that Connacht match. Huge win from a strong Connacht side.

Like you I’m due to meet a mate for a few tomorrow. He’s a die hard Leinster fan and I haven’t seen him since before Christmas when Leinster were still in the HC and he was confident Munster wouldn’t get out of their group. He’ll be waiting and waiting for me to mention it so I’ll lull him into a false sense of security by not even mentioning rugby fur the first hour or two then out of nowhere just ask what he thought of Zebo’s hat trick against Racing. It’s going to be sweet.

Thanks for the reply Wyrm. I’m aware of what the “regions” notionally represent. Experience suggests that people in Ceredigion are too busy watching football/concerning themselves with matters of no interest outside Ceredigion to be aware that the Scarlets are scouring the county to find the front five forwards they need to become remotely effective against decent teams. That’s not to say they could be found there in any case mind.

Another very interesting book on France:
“That Sweet Enemy”
A comparative history of England and France from Louis XIV to present day – written by an Anglo French husband and wife team……………
Compulsory reading for expats, in my book – both serious and funny

“Which of the Welsh team” not teams. See, I was sure I’d misunderstood. The perils of dashing off a reply before driving off on pick-up duty.

I’m not sure about which players are from the Cardiganshire area, I’m afraid. My dad’s from up that way though and there’s certainly rugby played there (I remember getting a hiding from the Crymych team, although I think they’re technically north Pembrokeshire area).

Anyway, I’m clearly not good for very much right now. Going to watch that goat video again and call it a night. Toodles!

Never been to much of the east (Inverness aside)- will try to do so some time as all travels in Scotland have been worthwhile so far – even the ones to some of the grimmer places. All my connections are central or west though for the time being and take up a good chunk of my opportunities to get away such as they are.

Funnily enough have intended to go to Denmark for a long time but never made it yet. Not planning on swimming it in a direct line from Fife though.

Also to be fair, NGD have missed Lydiate because of injury*. And I thought the lad Hugh Gustafson might have developed into a good LH** Coombs has been a revelation.

But they were doomed, doomed I tellya, from the start. Gwent does not have the infrastructure to maintain a regional side, and the insistence of basing themselves around Newport has been another short sighted and parochial flop. The map below shows how imbalanced the whole regional set up is, whereas a straight forward N.E.W.S utilising all the existing union clubs facilities and rotating the fixtures between those clubs would have been more inclusive.

Add to that the WRU could have made loans to build an headquarters at the centre of each region to deal with training, recruitment and administration, new identities could have been forged?

Below it would have been easier to divide up the NEW welsh rugby regions as so, even the old tribal names could have been put forward?

*So have Wales, get well soon Dan, but don’t be rushing back for the England game as the press are telling us. Sit this 6N out, recover in France and then get back into the team slowly.

**Just went to look at his profile on wiki, they have him down as a hooker?

NGD are going to carry on missing Lydiate though. I certainly feel sorry for them as pretty much anyone good enough to get noticed leaves and they’ve had a few injury retirements as well I think. They are, however, clearly unable to compete at the moment. Doesn’t mean they should be got rid of, think we just have to hope they can improve, but it is pretty unpleasant to watch.

Obviously they’re not going to finish last as Zebres are there, their thing being to dress up as zebras every week and get humped (I think this is something to be admired, but there you are). Could only be a matter of time though.

I love the Rabodirect Pro12.

Not sure if the level of interest in the north could justify reducing the number of professional teams in the south?

Re Silures etc – remember all this lot from reading Robert Graves. Also remember that some of the welsh were supposedly mediterranean looking when the Romans got there so the Lebanese issue someone was having may go back further than he thought.

A long time ago now, before the regions were set up, when I first took my tentative steps into writing on comments pages, forums and blogs. I flogged that idea to death in all the Welsh papers and forums, and even got involved in writing to the WRU with my suggestions. I think there was an open forum run by the WRU for the public’s suggestions on what would be seen to be the best way to divide up the country, and promote rugby to a wider audience?

Although it was a bit tongue in cheek, I thought it was not too far from being a workable solution, as it would give an identity to how the country has been divided on other levels, socially, politically culturally and through the most divisive aspect of Welsh life the language .

Unfortunately my writing and grammar skills were far worse than they are now, (hard to believe I know). I spent more time dealing with others on semantics and pedantry than dealing with ideas and innovations. I only stayed in Wales a short time after that, the small goldfish bowl is really an understatement in all walks of life, and there are a few big fish that make the decisions.

Daff, I think it’s an excellent idea. Far better than the other silly names they come up with for sporting teams, because it would have some local resonance, rather than the juvenile alliteration dreamt up by some marketing buffoon. Sale Sharks FFS: what’s wrong with Sale? Kudos to Bath and Quins for rejecting this nonsense.

One of the objections some fans have to Steve Diamond is the hints he gave (later denied) about dropping Sale from the name.

Morning CMW.
If you are interested in visiting Denmark the best advice I can give you is that it’s a country of contradictions in all walks of life! A bit vague I know, but when you get here you’ll understand what I mean.

I listened to Je suis Quinziste et Socialiste this morning, really enjoyed it. Thanks a lot for posting it – just a pity that there aren’t slides to go with some of his description! Extremely fascinating, and it paints an intriguing picture of some of the aspects of culture, language and rugby we were talking about last night. Tidy!

brookter – I can’t think of a single one of the new silly names that works other than the ones that already existed before professionalism.Even having said that I thought formalising some of them was irritating, but still better than calling the Ospreys the Ospreys.

Quins I think has the advantage of a long history, like the Corinthians, and it would have been silly for them to change it now. It’s not an attempt to add ‘excitement’ and ‘glamour’ and ‘branding’ and other juvenile bollocks to an existing team as with Sale Sharks and Exeter Pirates etc. Has anyone really ever thought: “I wasn’t going to go a rugby match but now the team’s called Sharks, I can’t wait.”?

I guess League was pretty shameless with soft-rock performers and cheerleaders before Challenge Cup finals anyway. Shame that some of their teams that had perfectly good (nick)names felt the need to change to inferior ones though. Union seems to have picked up on all the other sorts of nonsense too though.

Osprey’s a terrible name, it’s not like it signifies anything to that region, are there any real Ospreys in the S. Wales region.

At least the American sports, that I presume started this fashion for that added name have a link to the (don’t know what it’s called?) as in Steelers, 49ers, Dolphins, Lakers etc

@killer

My old man was from Backworth, North Shields so I kind of know the area well, at least you have the Northumberland Coastline, which is a canny place to visit, Denmark’s just a bit, meh but a great place to live!